Punishment in the form of limitation of freedom: legislation and practice of appointment and implementation

The study of the aspects of the appointment and execution of criminal punishment in the form of restraint of freedom shows the following results. The path of humanization of the criminal-executive law, creation and introduction of penalties in alternative to imprisonment in criminal-executive practice, is one of the most promising options for the development and improvement of the system of criminal penalties. An analysis of the court practice in Novosibirsk demonstrates that the restriction on leaving the boundaries of a municipal formation in court practice is applied in approximately 82% of cases of imposing a penalty in the form of restraint of liberty. Concerning the definition of the place of permanent residence of the convict in practice causes difficulties, since the need for registration at the place of residence gives rise to many legal obstacles, and the actual stay of an individual is not legally recorded anywhere. Thus, a convicted person may reside in one region of the country, and be registered elsewhere, where there are no actual conditions for the person’s residence during the period of serving a sentence in the form of restriction of freedom. This circumstance allows us to conclude that it is possible that these factors make it relatively rare for courts to impose a penalty in the form of restraint of liberty. In addition, the execution of this punishment is possible only through the use of technical means of control and supervision of convicts, since periodic inspections of the staff of the penitentiary inspectorate do not guarantee fulfillment of this restriction. This type of punishment includes a restriction on visits to certain places located within the territory of the relevant municipal formation and places of mass and other events and to participate in these events, but the notion of a mass event is not legally fixed. In this regard, the verdict must specify the specific types of mass and other events, to participate in which is prohibited, as well as specific places that are prohibited from visiting the convicted person. Thus, in the process of improving legislation, it is important to take into account the problems of the practice of appointing and executing punishment in the form of restraint of liberty.